Simpson's paradox - <AUTHOR> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpsons_paradox <comment><USER2> The most fascinating aspect is that once you recognize the issue, you can't simply rely on using just the partitioned data or the aggregate. Be sure to read the "Implications to decision making" section.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpsons_paradox#Implications_t...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpsons_paradox#Implications_to_decision_making)

 _The practical significance of Simpson's paradox surfaces in decision making situations where it poses the following dilemma: Which data should we consult in choosing an action, the aggregated or the partitioned? In the Kidney Stone example above, it is clear that if one is diagnosed with "Small Stones" or "Large Stones" the data for the respective subpopulation should be consulted and Treatment A would be preferred to Treatment B. But what if a patient is not diagnosed, and the size of the stone is not known; would it be appropriate to consult the aggregated data and administer Treatment B? This would stand contrary to common sense; a treatment that is preferred both under one condition and under its negation should also be preferred when the condition is unknown.

On the other hand, if the partitioned data is to be preferred a priori, what prevents one from partitioning the data into arbitrary sub-categories (say based on eye color or post-treatment pain) artificially constructed to yield wrong choices of treatments? Pearl[2] shows that, indeed, in many cases it is the aggregated, not the partitioned data that gives the correct choice of action. Worse yet, given the same table, one should sometimes follow the partitioned and sometimes the aggregated data, depending on the story behind the data; with each story dictating its own choice. Pearl[2] considers this to be the real paradox behind Simpson's reversal.

As to why and how a story, not data, should dictate choices, the answer is that it is the story which encodes the causal relationships among the variables. Once we extract these relationships and represent them in a graph called a causal Bayesian network we can test algorithmically whether a given partition, representing confounding variables, gives the correct answer. The test, called "back-door," requires that we check whether the nodes corresponding to the confounding variables intercept certain paths in the graph. This reduces Simpson's Paradox to an exercise in graph theory._

<comment><USER3> To not stand too long on my soapbox, causal Bayesian networks are, I think, the most important tool for high level statistics users. I wish Pearl were more popular.

<comment><USER4> Fortunately, Pearl has distilled the highlights of his book _Causality_ into a 50-page paper that makes a great introduction to the modern theory of causation:

<http://ftp.cs.ucla.edu/pub/stat_ser/r350.pdf>

Through this paper, and others like it, Pearl's ideas are gaining traction.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think this and "Anscombe's Quartet" <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anscombe%27s_quartet> are great examples of why you should look at your data before trying to analyze it.

</comment><comment><USER6> The "Berekley gender bias case" section made it make sense to me. Every single department was more likely to admit a woman than a man, and yet the school as a whole was more likely to admit a man than a woman.

This was because women were applying to more competitive departments, on average, so a lower percentage of women applicants were getting admitted.

<comment><USER7> > Every single department was more likely to admit a woman than a man

Not quite; you can see several exceptions to this in the table in the article.

The key points of the partitioned data were:

No department was _significantly_ biased against women.

 _Most_ departments had a statistically significant bias towards women.

It's interesting to note that the departments that ARE biased towards men have more female applicants; I wonder if being in a minority group for that department is an even more important confounding factor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I like how the article uses "Lisa" and "Bart" for people's name in the example: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpsons_paradox#Description>

<comment><USER9> When I saw the post title I had my fingers crossed hoping "please be a paradox based on something from The Simpsons". Oh well... Interesting nonetheless

<comment><USER10> I think that Simpson's Paradox is: "You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't."

<comment><USER11> <pedantic-nitpicky-internet-comment> Thats not technically a paradox </pedantic-nitpicky-internet-comment>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I think the take-home here is summarized here:

 _This imagined paradox is caused when the percentage is provided but not the ratio. In this example, if only the 90% in the first week for Bart was provided but not the ratio (9:10), it would distort the information causing the imagined paradox. Even though Bart's percentage is higher for the first and second week, when two weeks of articles is combined, overall Lisa had improved a greater proportion, 55% of the 110 total articles. Lisa's proportional total of articles improved exceeds Bart's total._

So it's important to not rely on percentage data alone, as it is a form of reduction. Rely instead on ratios, allowing you to see the validity of the percentage.

On Amazon and review sites, when I search by rating, I always look at the number of reviews and weight accordingly. I remember that IMDB (before it became an Amazon property) implemented a beyesian posterior mean to cull out the low-review anomolies: [https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Internet_Movi...](https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Internet_Movie_Database#Ranking_.28IMDb_Top_250.29)

I wish other places like Amazon would implement similar weighting mechanisms to really allow a user to navigate by reviewed quality.

<comment><USER13> I glance at the 5 star reviews then head straight for the 1 stars.

Reviews aren't really ratio based - a single counter of the right kind can completely disuade me. I really don't want "low revie anomalies" culled.

I watched the Benoit Mandelbrot TED talk earlier, he had a graph of S&Ps stock market index normally compared to it win the five most anomalous daily trades removed - it was very different. Stock market models, he said, try to smooth out the rough bits which are hard to handle, but that's really where the meat is.

<comment><USER12> Sorry, when I said low-review anomalies, I'm talking products that are not reviewed enough (i.e., 5-star from a single review). They likely give an inaccurate view of the product.

Comparing two separate products, of which one has 100 reviews and another has 7, I'll take the 100-review rating as more "interesting" than the 7-review product, even though the 7-review item maybe rated higher.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Unintended consequence of reading the article: I need to rethink decades of conditioning. I thought Republicans opposed the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

<comment><USER15> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Democrats>

There was a time when the Republicans were at least as liberal as the Democrats.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Simpson's paradox is amazing, it's worth reading all the examples in the article and really understanding it.

Another good source is Martin Gardner's "Aha! Gotcha" book. He presents the paradox as a woman trying to find eligible bachelors at a party. In room 1 her odds are better if she goes for guys with mustaches. In room 2 her odds are also better if she goes for guys with mustaches. But when everyone goes into one room, her odds are better for guys _without_ mustaches. It's incredible.

</comment><comment><USER17> It's not really that interesting, and the paradoxical/unexpected aspects of it go away once you start looking at everything through the lenses of conditional probability theory. e.g. <http://uncertainty.stat.cmu.edu/> goes over it as early as chapter 2.

</comment><comment><USER18> This happens to students on a fairly consistent basis.

Suppose a project is worth 10% of the student's final mark while a midterm is worth 30% and the final exam is worth 60%. If the student performs well on the project, average on the midterm, but poorly on the Final Exam, their mark is still going to be poor due to the heavier weighting of the exam and midterm over the project.

EDIT: I know it's not a perfect example, but comparing marks between different students based on how they are weighted is essentially the idea.

<comment><USER19> That's not quite right. The "paradoxical" version would be something like:

Alice and Bob are taking a course where their grades are determined by 5 essays and/or presentations, and they can choose how many of each to do. Alice does one essay where she earns 80%, and 4 presentations where she earns an average of 90%. Bob does 4 essays earning an average of 85%, and one presentation where he earns 95%. For each assignment type Bob has a higher average than Alice, but Alice's overall grade (assuming equal weighting) is higher than Bob's: Alice gets 88% ((80 + 4 * 90)/5) and Bob gets 87% ((4 * 85 + 95)/5).

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> "A real-life example is the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Overall, a higher ratio of Republicans voted in favor of the Act than Democrats. However, when the congressional delegations from the northern and southern States are considered separately, a higher ratio of Democrats voted in favor of the act in both regions. This arose because regional affiliation is a very strong indicator of how a congressman or senator voted, whereas party affiliation is a weak indicator."

The chart then shows that the "Northern" House had 316 members vs. the South's 104, and that the "Northern" Senate had 78 members vs. the South's 22.

Uh... the South has Florida, Texas, and California. How can it be represented by less than a _quarter_ of Congress? I mean, the Senate makes a bit more sense due to the tiny states of the northeast and such (though it still seems low), but the House too? Really?

Makes me wonder how exactly they classified South vs. North... Former Confederate states vs. everyone else? Either way, Geography cannot be a major factor.

<comment><USER21> In US geography, "The South" means something very different to the southern half of the country. Likewise, "The Midwest" is concentrated entirely in the eastern half of the country. "The South" is really the south-east corner of the country.

Is it just confederate states? Well, eleven states seceded, and 22 senators implies eleven states, so probably. Not sure where Kentucky fits in.

<comment><USER22> Being from the upper midwest, I always considered "the South" anything south of the Mason-Dixon Line plus W.Va and Kentucky. Wow this is off-topic.

Little gems of insight like Simpson's paradox are why I studied statistics.</comment></comment></comment>


Richard Feynman explains the feeling of confusion - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lytxafTXg6c&feature=related <comment><USER2> Is there anywhere I can go to find/buy videos of the man?</comment>


Show HN: Convert your annual salary into an hourly rate - <AUTHOR> http://dpmehta.com/portfolio/calculator.html <comment><USER2> I can save you the time: divide by 2000 to get very close.

There's 2080 work hours in a year (52 weeks, 40 hours per week).

So _technically_ you should divide by 2080, but dividing by 2000 is a lot faster in your head (drop three zeroes, and halve).

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback warrenm. Heuristics can be useful, but I built this calculator to help freelancers account for opportunity costs and unexpected expenses in their rates. For example, someone who makes a $100,000 salary would charge 100,000/2080 = $48/hour by the measure you described. However, I don't believe that rate accounts for PTO, National Holidays, Health Insurance, Business Development time, self-employment taxes and many other things. A more realistic equivalency in my experience (and according to the calculator) would be $100-$125/hour.

Hope that's helpful.

<comment><USER3> In my experience, people tend to greatly underestimate how much it will cost them to pay both the employer and the employee part of insurance, as well as other expenses typically paid by an employer.

The rule of thumb I arrived at years ago was to start by dividing the annual rate by a factor of two, to account for the additional tax burden. Then to divide by an additional factor of two to account for the additional insurance burden.

Then you start factoring in your other costs.

Years ago, I was contracting with Apple Retail Software Engineering in Cupertino, and making $95/hr. I calculated that they would have to give me a $250,000 annual salary to be able to take home the same amount of money on a monthly basis, and virtually no one at Apple makes that kind of money unless they're an SVP.

So, I was actually quite happy when the contract ended and I got to go home to Austin.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Why is this a slide bar instead of an input field where I can enter the number?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback. I thought it would be easier for users to simply slide a scale rather than manually input numbers (which I feel is error prone and more work), especially on a mobile device.

In the next iteration I'm considering allowing users to use either option, sliding scale or direct input.</comment></comment>


Anatomy of a Killing - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/bbcafrica/status/1044186344153583616 <comment><USER2> It's fascinating to me that all the information required for the analysis is publicly available. This seems like a big shift from an era when only an intelligence agency would have been able to perform this sort of analysis.

<comment><USER3> The "open source intelligence" report on the MH17 incident -- where people found social media videos of the Buk missile proceeding through the countryside before being used to down the passenger jet -- was super interesting in a similar vein: [https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and- europe/2015/10/08/mh1...](https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and- europe/2015/10/08/mh17-the-open-source-evidence/)

<comment><USER4> There are plenty of people doing open source data gathering and investigations. It's pretty interesting. Bellingcat is one of such orgs.

You can find a lot of individuals and small orgs on Twitter doing stuff like spotting military ships and their cargo, spotting drones on satellite imagery, collecting lists of destroyed heavy weapons, listing ATGM attacks, airstrike victims (airwars.com), geolocating videos/pictures posted to social media, colleting info on chemical attacks (bellingcat), collecting and publishing ISIS documents online, recreating 3D models of some events from public videos/photos, etc.

One example of 3D modelling (they call it forensic architecutre) based on open source data is in this report on Douma attack:

[https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/middleeast/1000000058408...](https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/middleeast/100000005840873/syria- chlorine-bomb-assad.html)

<comment><USER5> > There are plenty of people doing open source data gathering and > investigations. It's pretty interesting. Bellingcat is one of such orgs.

Bellingcat is also a great example of what it shouldn't be. Most of what is produced is misleading at best. Some of the core "experts" (i.e Dan Kaszeta) are closer to propaganda generators than genuine researchers or informed sources.

<comment><USER4> I dunno, I'm exposed to Bellingcat only via the work of Elliot Higgins, so I'm not able to judge other contributors for myself. But it's very frequent to call people's work propaganda these days, just because someone disagrees. So unless you have more info, it doesn't mean much.

<comment><USER5> Higgins is the person who groomed Kaszeta, together they formed the theory behind hexamine being used as an acid scavenger on the first Sarin chemical attacks attributed to the Syrian government. Together they tried to take on MIT's Postol and others who found it ridiculous (and implausible at best).

If you followed Higgins prior to Bellingcat (back when he was "Brown Moses") you'd know he had a strong bias for the rebellion which has since just turned into a strong anti-government bias, strong interventionalism and explicitly anti-Russian.

A great example of how their bias slips into their analyses is examples like the fake sniper boy[0] which fooled a lot of anti-government "experts" to the point where people like Higgins tried to organise witch hunts against the scene director.

[0] [https://journal-neo.org/2014/11/27/what-the-fake-syria- snipe...](https://journal-neo.org/2014/11/27/what-the-fake-syria-sniper-boy- video-tell-us-about-media-experts/)

<comment><USER4> While I agree I see personal bias in what he writes on Twitter, I'd hardly call it pro-rebel. Anti-government (more like anti-syrian regime), sure. It show in the choice of topics. But the question is how much it shows in the analysis itself.

As for Hexamine/Sarin attack/Postol issue: Hexamine was found in Sarin attacks by OPCW, it was declared by Syria to OPCW. Postol is not a chemist, nor CW expert, nor on the ground, nor very credible wrt his claims about Syrian chemical attacks, as several of his claims were already rejected by OPCW, who found Syrian regime responsible for the April 4 2017 attack (Postol had all kinds of theories about this attack). I prefer OPCW's conculsions to some random profesor's taking sides and judging from a distance.

[https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Timeline-of-Syrian- Ch...](https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Timeline-of-Syrian-Chemical- Weapons-Activity)

You quoted Partisangirl, and I just can't take her seriously as an unbiased source either. Just one recent example of clear bias: Despite big civilian protests last few weeks in Idlib, she only tweeted one picture of some marching jihadists. She's very clearly pro assad-regime, at the expense of truth, accuracy, and peoples lives for that matter.

So yeah, Higgins is biased, but quoting other biased, non-expert sources doesn't really improve the matters.

Re: fake sniper. The experiment can be both revealing of reporting bias and highly irresponsible. People criticized the irresponsibility angle at the time. Witch hunt seems to be your interpretation.

<comment><USER5> I cited that article about the existence of the fake sniper video, just because "fake sniper boy" doesn't mean much on its own. That's it. I could have used any other link.

I appreciate that you might have issues with the author of that article but it's not what I was going for. It's unfair to suggest that I'm quoting biased sources when I didn't quote them, just merely wanted to provide context of which video I was talking about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> A brilliant piece of work to place the location.

On the other hand, this seems to be...below...the BBC:

" _The government statement makes clear that all these men enjoy the presumption of innocence, and that they will be given a fair trial._ "

" _The two women killed outside Zelevet received no trial at all._

" _No presumption of innocence was extended to the children who died with them._ "

<comment><USER7> You won't make such statements if you saw the complete video.

To kill unarmed women and children? Sheesh, what would you have written in place of those?

<comment><USER8> "The government statement makes clear that all these men were arrested, and that they will be given a trial."

See, you just ditch "enjoy" and "fair" parts and it goes neutral. You don't have to be neutral, but news do.

<comment><USER9> Neither of those words are adding what you think they are adding to that sentence

<comment><USER8> I'm pretty sure that I can distinguish neutral from emotional.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Incredible bit of analysis and presentation.

It's hard to watch this sort of footage for me now. Once upon a time when I was younger I could handle it, but with young children the same sort of age it really tears me apart. Though, I think people should be forced to confront it, because it's the only way it's ever going to improve.

<comment><USER11> Totally. In terms of handling it, there was a French horror film "Inside" which is very good but involves attacking a pregnant woman. After having kids I found I just couldn't stomach it, which was a change. Same for Sicario's child murder scene which I found just terribly lazy and desperate to be "edgy" and all these rave reviews just pissed me off. Having kids definitely over sensitized me.. in a good way.

<comment><USER12> There was a Frontline show about life in North Korea, they follow some folks who sneak into North Korea and try to distribute food / money to the poor.

One child about 5 or 6 they meet says his mom had to go to the next town to work and had to leave him ... she never came back.

The little boy tells the story as directly as a 5 year old would tell it, he is homeless with no family fending for himself in the streets.

At the time my oldest was 5.... I can't get that child's voice and image out of my head.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This is one example of routine acts committed by Cameroon's military especially in the English-speaking regions. No reaction from international community. Instead, the west is asking Cameroon to investigate. They're basically asking Cameroon govt to cover up its atrocities.

Video clearly shows Cameroon military shooting at mother with children. Same as hundreds of other incidents. What's there to investigate?

Condemn the actions and let the govt face consequences.

<comment><USER14> Interesting. When I was in the US Naval Academy, I had a Camaroonean roommate that was going to go to the academy, then become an officer of his homeland's military. I wonder if the US military is still training Cameroonian officers today.

<comment><USER15> Not sure what years you went through but I remember we had one (about a decade ago).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I can't imagine this kind of analysis carrying much weight in 3-5 years as advances in machine learning and image manipulation turn the notion of "seeing is believing" on its head.

edit: Imagine running this process in reverse. Pick the culprit, time, and location. Then arrange the scene to exactly match the false accusation.

Probably didn't happen here, but in a few years it won't be possible to know the difference.

<comment><USER17> I keep meaning to write up a longer form version of this idea that I've been kicking around to solve this.

This issue is often talked about as an unsolvable problem, but I feel like we already have the technology to deal with it.

Lots of devices, such as an iPhone already have a secure enclave that can be used for identity. Why not use this to sign videos and images for authentication purposes?

Then certain devices can produce verified, undoctored images and videos. Or even allow some amount of limited tweaking, and editing while attesting to the original.

This could be embedded into the file produced, like exif data, and read by services like Facebook and Twitter to badge the image/video as verified and undoctored. This could improve the amature case significantly.

Professional photography and video equipment could have similar capabilities so originals could be produced and proven to be genuine.

I guess this idea still depends on the hardware devices remaining secure, which is far from trivial, but it does increase the cost of producing a fake. And to keep producing really good fakes, you have to have a zero day to fake a genuine signature, or it becomes know that any media produced with that device version is suspect.

If such a system became widly adopted, at the very least, savvy users, and the media would be suspect of anything not signed. And perhaps the general public would also learn to be skeptical, particularly if the issue of fakes became more widespread.

<comment><USER18> Haha I was also thinking about using an HSM module to sign videos [1]. I think the problem is that anyone can just record a projector screen and replay audio through some speakers, and then Facebook and Twitter will still badge the video as verified and undoctored. You could detect this by analyzing the video and audio, but then it's just an arms race with machine learning.

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18074425](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18074425)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> It all comes back to the original tip from a "Cameroonian source." Without that, they wouldn't have only had a ridgeline somewhere in (probably) Cameroon.

<comment><USER20> That's a good point.

Makes me wonder if that 2D mountain range projection could be used to 'search' through a 3D map for a match.

<comment> pure-awesome Coincidentally, I had exactly just that thought about a week ago whilst I was staring out at a nearby mountain.

I have very little knowledge about this kind of problem, but to me, it seems like a solvable problem - there has been some interesting work in reconstructing 3D models from photographs of objects (I have a friend who did his masters in something similar) and I don't doubt that people working on that type of problem would likely have some ideas for approaching this one.

Though to make it tractable one would perhaps want to "weight" the algorithm / start the search from likely vantage points (i.e. from inside cities / on top of buildings, and along roads), and take some discrete samples of what the mountain range would look like at various angles from that point.

I wonder if it would be possible to do something similar to a binary search or Newton's method type thing where if you have two nearby points looking at the same mountain range, you could figure out the probability that the actual vantage point lies somewhere in the vague area between those points, and so get a better idea of where to take more precise samples after you've started with a few discrete samples.

<comment><USER21> This should be a tractable problem. Cruise missiles navigate by matching the terrain they're flying by with a 3d model.

Doing it with 2d video and not having precise starting coordinates, speed/heading/altitude makes the search space larger but I think that is more than made up for by the fact that you're not trying to do it all on embedded hardware from the 80s.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> That mountain ridge trick, how reliable of an identifier is that? I'm not really questioning the validity of its use in this situation, but I'd be curious to know more about the nature of the ridge to gps coordinates mapping. How many ridges map to more than one gps coordinate (albeit at potentially very distant locations, one of which could be excluded if more information is available)? Or is the mapping completely injective? That'd be really cool, a bit surprising, but not infeasible.

Sounds like a fun data science project. (Draw a ridge and get a google street view image whose horizon matches the ridge as closely as possible, maybe? Might be fun to play with!)

<comment><USER23> I think they mention they located the mountains not from the ridge outline, but from a tip-off they received about where it all happened, and then they corroborated that tip against the ridge outline, building placement, roads, etc.

 _> After a tip off from a Cameroonian source, we found an exact match for that ridge line on Google Earth_

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> On one page: [https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1044186344153583616.html](https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1044186344153583616.html)

<comment><USER25> In the original video form: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4G9S-eoLgX4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4G9S-eoLgX4)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Just in case anyone else is as confused as I was, if you don't hit "play" on the picture of the ridge-line, you won't see the match. Or maybe I'm the only one who was wondering how that could be considered a match, until I figured out to do that.

</comment><comment><USER27> This answers all the questions but why.

<comment><USER28> Does it really matter? That's not the way to deal with even the most vicious of criminals, let alone his child.

<comment><USER27> Yes it does matter. Tremendously.

For example is this soldiers initiative or part of a general tactics encouraged by the higher command?

Was the execution justified (i.e. motivated, that is, it was not a cover up or a random killing)?

I can come up with few reasons to kill the woman but why the child? Is there some message behind this killing?

Naturally these questions do not matter for despising such behaviour but are important to help to understand the human nature.

<comment><USER29> They murdered two children.

<comment><USER30> Yes, but why? They're up there fighting Boko Haram -- this is a war-torn part of the world. Why is the Cameroonian military killing the people they're charged with protecting?

It's something I'd really like to know, after reading through this. I don't understand anything but the most superficial issues facing this region, and it rather shocked me that the national military that's up there to quell the Boko Haram insurgency is committing these atrocities.

I mean, yes, people kill people for fun. People kill children because they're monsters, and I get that. But is that what's happening here? Or is this ethnic cleansing? Or is this something else entirely?

<comment><USER7> The french population doesn't like the English population. The English part is a minority and feel like a 2nd class citizen in their own country. A lot of them are being killed, you can google these answers. [https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world- africa-44459488/cameroon-c...](https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world- africa-44459488/cameroon-crisis-explained)

<comment><USER31> This is seriously about what language they speak?

<comment><USER32> Does that really surprise you?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> This is some impressive video forensics.

<comment><USER19> It all started with a tip that gave them the general area though.

This is my favorite example of gathering data just from examining a video: [https://www.bellingcat.com/resources/case- studies/2014/08/22...](https://www.bellingcat.com/resources/case- studies/2014/08/22/gun-safety-self-defense-and-road-marches-finding-an-isis- training-camp/)

<comment><USER34> > It all started with a tip that gave them the general area _though_

You've made this point twice in the comments. What are you getting at?

<comment><USER19> Just that the investigation hinges on decidedly non-technical/novel methods. It is an interesting news story and presentation but isn't as unique as I think people who just skimmed the twitter thread might assume.

<comment><USER31> So we're just going to dismiss the fact that they used social media to get the tip in the first place?

It's incredible boot leather investigative journalism in 2018 and doesn't need to be qualified. What are you? A paper salesman?

<comment><USER19> I totally agree that it is great journalism and is worth recognizing for no other reason than that. I think I was just being extra sour because it was the end of a long day and probably should not have been commenting on the internet. :(

Where did they mention that they used social media to get the tip? Or are you referring to the fact that the video spread via social media (which wouldn't have happened x years ago) and presumably led someone to reach out to them? Not being argumentative, just curious.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Could BBC please share the code for matching mountain ridges with locations?

They claim that the first mountain ridge was located by a tip from a Cameroonian source. Here they _verify_ the ridge with the mountain ridges from a height map.

But later on without mentioning any tip or source they "found" an Channel4 news report in archives with again a mountain ridge match. I consider 3) possibilities:

1) They manually watched all the footage from the last few years in that area, freeze framing them whenever they see a mountain ridge, then manually trace it. I don't believe this is what happened, that's too many man hours.

2) They knew through other means (perhaps camera gps location metadata, perhaps report description/summary) that the report video was taken near the massacre video. Because of this metadata/textual data they were able to realize they had nearby footage of an outpost by querying for the massacre location. But then they fail to mention this trivial step and make a bit of a show by highlighting some features and again a mountain ridge. So in this case they have a database of archive footage and filter by location/time.

3) They have automated software for isolating mountain ridge profiles from footage (perhaps edge detection? remove all edges that don't appear to undergo rigid body motion? but how filter clouds etc?), and matching software for locating where on the heightmap it the footage was made. In this case it is explainable without ridiculous man hours or ridiculous showmanship (instead of mentioning say GPS coordinate metadata of the journalism camera). But in this case perhaps BBC could share this code with the public?

</comment><comment><USER36> Did the BBC's analysis cause the Cameroon government to come clean and start proceedings against the soldiers or was that coincidental?

</comment><comment><USER37> Below the BBC's thread, an insightful comment by John Odande:

 _> As Africans, we like saying "African solutions to African problems" yet it is funny that we continue relying on international media to relay accurate information and challenge governments' positions all over the continent. Great job BBC Africa!_

</comment><comment><USER38> Wow. This is an amazing piece of investigative journalism and probably one of the reasons we should all be supporting an independent media.

</comment><comment><USER39> At the end they bemoan the fact that the men are facing trial and will be presumed innocent until proven guilty. I expect better from the BBC

<comment><USER40> "Bemoan" is a strong word. The government whose soldiers murdered these women and children called it "fake news", declaring their innocence before even investigating. The BBC is criticising that disgusting behavior by contrasting their emphasis of the soldier's legal innocence until proven guilty with the neglect they exhibited for the people who were executed.

<comment><USER41> I can see that perspective, I too thought the wording was negligent.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Heart breaking. Congratulations to the BBC for this amazing analysis. But real justice would require telling the story of how these women came to be murdered. This region in Cameroon is a flash point for a regional fight against a Muslim fundamentalist / warlord group called Boko Haram (translates as "western education is a sin"). How and why did these four civilians come to be murdered as a part of this tragic conflict in one of the poorest parts of the world?

<comment><USER43> For the motive, you'd probably have to ask the murderers. But there's a long tragic history of opportunistic cruelty against women and children (and indeed men, though that's clouded with arguments about combatant status) in warzones.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> I'm shocked how well Twitter worked here, normally I dread reading long tweet threads but this worked really well. Short videos and a good mix of media helps a ton.

</comment><comment><USER45> They should not edit out the end of the video. People should know how harsh the world can get.

<comment> DC-3 It's not like anyone is in doubts as to what happens, therefore to show the killings themselves would be somewhat gratuitous.

<comment><USER45> It's not about people not knowing what happens, it's about people not understanding the significance of what happens. Watching videos and seeing pictures can make you understand the meaning of murder, massacre, and genocide in a way that headlines never can.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> How do we know the whole thing isn't staged? I mean it's not as if getting weapons and uniforms is hard in that part of Africa.

</comment><comment><USER47> Man I hate twitter as a delivery for content like this. I'd love to see it as a proper article rather than some toy.

</comment><comment><USER48> Why a twitter link and not the oc at BBC?

<comment><AUTHOR> The linked tweet is from the official BBC account, @BBCAfrica. I did Google around for the article page on the BBC's site [0], but submitted the Twitter link because the BBC page isn't an article, but a 10 minute video (which also wasn't playing correctly on my phone). The Twitter thread is fairly easy to read as an article.

[0] [https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world- africa-45599973/cameroon-a...](https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world- africa-45599973/cameroon-atrocity-finding-the-soldiers-who-killed-this-woman)

</comment></comment><comment><USER49> The footage made me very sad. The people have to live in extreme poverty and on top of that hardship they also have to suffer such unspeakable violence. BBC has done a great job of bringing the war criminals to justice.

</comment><comment><USER31> Powerful and absolutely stunning work. This, _this_ is investigative journalism in the modern era.

I think it's worth noting that, as despicable as some of their work can be, Anon pioneered this kind of digital forensic work.

</comment><comment><USER50> Here is the full video package on this from BBC Africa:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbnLkc6r3yc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbnLkc6r3yc)

</comment><comment><USER51> That's some real life CSI stuff.

</comment><comment><USER52> how long until AI can do all of this?

<comment><USER53> Interesting, vmaini. Do you mean identify the time/location/persons or kill innocent civilians?

<comment><USER54> What is your desired precision/recall rate

<comment><USER55> Well, if the AI gets to do both, you can make the precision arbitrarily high...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> On the one hand I think this is really impressive and am somewhat excited that they have been able to do this. On the other hand, I'm also somewhat fearful about the future. For example, what if, in this age of constant surveillance, techniques like these get more automated, and repressive governments are able to more easily and more quickly identify investigative journalists at locations they would not want them to be?</comment>


First Amazon Took Down Booksellers….Are Publishers Next? - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/01/12/first-amazon-took-down-booksellers-are-publishers-next/

<comment><USER2> I absolutely hope so. Publishers in large have taken complete advantage in a lot of areas. It's absolutely insane when community college students end up paying nearly the same amount for books as then do for 6-10 hours of courses. I cannot wait to see more competition in the publishing world.</comment>


Ask HN: What functions/forms should all lisps have? - <AUTHOR> I'm writing a lisp and I'm curious if there's a consensus on what constitutes a "minimum lisp". I'm not planning to implement the full extent of Common Lisp, and probably not even Scheme, but I'd like mine to have all of the basics, whatever "the basics" are expected to be.<p>Any resources or suggestions on this? So far I've got car/cdr/cons, list, all the basic math operators, print, lambda, and/or/not, basic equality and numeric comparisons, eval, define, begin (block), cond, and if. <comment><USER2> \- Characters and strings.

\- Support for making a program using multiple files, and I/O.

\- Error recovery

</comment><comment><USER3> Minimal might not be the word you're looking for; a truly minimal lisp just has lambdas, from which you can implement everything else.</comment>


Ask HN: Best intro to Emacs, Latex, Python? - <AUTHOR>

I'm currently an ee student in college, and I was talking to a professor about doing some research. He suggested that these things would be helpful to know. So what would you suggest for an introduction to emacs, latex, and python? Programming wise, I'm familiar with c++ and I've started working my way through SICP. <comment><USER2> For LaTeX, Google the "Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2E", a fairly short PDF which I found covered almost everything I normally used.

There are a million EMACS cheat sheets out there, but honestly I would find someone you know who uses it. Their enthusiasm will probably help you to learn it better. [Personally, I use "vim". :)]

Python's own documentation links at "python.org" are pretty good. The language itself is quite simple and where you'll spend most of your time is browsing their library documentation anyway.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the info, I've checked out the latex pdf, and so far I'm impressed with it.</comment></comment>


Happstack gets a new brand identity (Haskell Application Server Stack) - <AUTHOR> http://happstack.com/index.html

<comment><USER2> The (new?) front page does a good job of answering "Why should I be interested in Happstack?", but I'd like to be able to drill down to more detail. For example:

"Happstack's unique MACID distributed persistent data storage layer is based on the lessons learned and shared by high traffic sites such as Amazon, eBay, Facebook, and reddit."

That sounds like either a killer feature or an overengineered pipe dream. I'd love to be able to find some code examples, or an article explaining what exactly MACID learns from the challenges of scaling Facebook and how it helps. It would be great if that "hook paragraph" had links to such articles so I didn't have to Google and filter results for quality.</comment>


Why Are Southerners So Fat? - <AUTHOR> http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1909406,00.html <comment><USER2> Too hot? Come on. I live in the "fat South" and just run first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Just like everyone else who's physically active here does.

I can't believe the author settled on "too hot" instead of "too uneducated". I guess the weather offends less people.

The South is both the poorest and least educated area of the country. Educated people eat better and exercise more because they know better.

<comment><USER3> Education is not the problem. I live in Mississippi, and can attest that we are bombarded daily with messages about obesity, diet, and exercise.

I am as educated as anyone on the mainstream teaching on this subject, yet I am clinically obese (though not for much longer).

I was poor as a child, so I think I can speak to this subject a little. It's anecdotal, but when accompanied by what I have learned from different sources (in particular, _Good Calories, Bad Calories_ by Gary Taubes), I suspect that my experience was typical.

Poor people eat an unhealthy diet because they cannot afford high quality protein and complex carbohydrates on a consistent basis. Further, parents in poor families often work excessive hours, and quick meals become the norm due to the lack of time.

This leads to an excessive consumption of refined carbohydrates, creating an insulin imbalance that increases hunger. One of the worst offenders in this category is soft drinks. White bread is another big problem. A coke and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich was a common meal around my house.

Sweet tea is another big offender. I have rarely seen sweet tea outside of the southeast, and almost everyone drinks it here. If you order tea in a restaurant, you are getting sweet tea unless you specifically request unsweetened.

Surely this enviroment is bad for adults, but I think it is particularly damaging for children. Kids that grow up with an excess of blood sugar and elevated insulin are headed for metabolic syndrome and Type II diabetes.

Make no mistake about it, it is insulin that controls fat storage. When your serum insulin is high, your body is storing fat. When it is low, you are converting fat stores to energy. No endocrinologist or reputable doctor anywhere will dispute this fact. Nutritionists are often unaware, resorting to the calories in - calories out causation fallacy.

When you eat lots of sugar and refined carbohydrates, your insulin is going to rise, and you are going to store fat. The worst part is that modern day nutritional education eschews fat and, to a smaller degree protein, in favor of carbohydrates, so the "educated" individual is really in no better position to regulate his endocrine system via diet and exercise.

<comment><USER4> I don't think you can just blame it all in poverty. People in poor countries (Philippines, Vietnam, Mexico) are much less obsese than Americans. And America had much less obesity when we were poorer as a country.

Being poor doesn't somehow cause you to drink soda. Water is still much cheaper.

<comment><USER3> People in eastern Asia have historically consumed sugar at an extremely low rate. In many of those countries, fruit passes as dessert.

Mexico is the second fattest country in the world (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_Mexico>), and soft drinks are used heavily there.

There are no calories in water. When your brain is inducing your body to increase blood glucose, you won't crave water. Sugary drinks are some of the most calorically dense (wrt volume and cost) foodstuffs you'll find. Poor people don't drink sodas because they are thirsty, they drink them because they are hungry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Because we tend to deep fry and eat anything not nailed down.

<comment><USER6> this, mostly.

its the culture of the food. not just deep frying, but, for example, we'll put two sticks of butter in or onto anything. sweet tea at every meal. etc..

the things the article mentioned certainly have some consequences on the situation, but its more about the things we stuff into our faces than other things.

<comment><USER7> Butter and fried food do not make people fat. Sugar and starch make people fat.

Southern food is loaded with sugar. Sweet tea is revolting to anyone with a healthy pallet.

<comment><USER8> Do you have any journal articles conclusively proving this? I'm aware of the impact sugar has on insulin levels and the insulin -> fat path, but I believe the medical consensus is that weight gain is primarily determined by the amount of calories eaten, not the type.

<comment><USER9> You are correct. So far the consensus opinion in medical research is that except for extreme ends of the dietary spectrum a calorie is a calorie. If you are trying to lose weight then some diets make the task a little easier than others, but otherwise the only equation that really matters is calories in as food vs. calories out as physical exertion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There are some people who think that obesity issues are a community-wide phenomenon, a kind of defective "groupthink" where people who are surrounded by other overweight or obese people actually stop seeing their own problem.

"Obesity is Contagious" <http://slog.thestranger.com/2007/07/obesity_is_contagious>

Random humorous observation on the OP article from _Time_ \-- unfortunate link placement following paragraph number four: _Many roads are narrower than those in the North — where streets have wider shoulders to accommodate winter snow — and people who want to bike or jog find themselves uncomfortably close to traffic. (See pictures of the perfect steak.)_

</comment><comment><USER11> We eat food that was appropriate when you worked outside for 12 hours a day. We also live in rural areas so you have to drive everywhere.

<comment><USER7> The lifestyle hasn't really changed that much in 40 years but the waistlines have. It's not like everyone was out swinging pick axes all day in the 60s. They were driving around and often sitting in AC, just like now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Why Are Writers for 'Time' so Patronizing?

<comment><USER13> Because they're wannabe novelists.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Kind of a dumb submission. The South is dominated by two ethnic groups, except for "hot and humid" Florida which also has a relatively low obesity rate.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Census-2000-Data-Top-US- An...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Census-2000-Data-Top-US-Ancestries- by-County.svg)

[http://www.sogoodblog.com/wp- content/uploads/2007/08/obesity...](http://www.sogoodblog.com/wp- content/uploads/2007/08/obesity-map.png)

<comment><USER2> Sorry, but do you have any statistics to support what I assume you're saying, that black people are more obese on average?

<comment><USER14> [http://184.108.40.206/search?q=cache:PfhBNYC8YsEJ:weight- loss...](http://188.8.131.52/search?q=cache:PfhBNYC8YsEJ:weight- loss.emedtv.com/obesity/obesity- statistics-p2.html+obesity+by+ethnicity+statistics&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a)

Black men are slightly less obese, black women significantly more obese. It's not just blacks but Scotch-Irish, for which I doubt there are statistics available, but the Bill Clinton/Boss Hogg body shape is not unusual.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I was born and raised in The South -- and returned 'home' a few years ago. I think this quote from the article has something to do with it: "Physical activity can be something as simple as walking to the bus stop. That's another problem, by the way: the South doesn't have many bus stops. Public transportation is paltry, and for most people, the best way to get around is by car."

I gave up my car last year. Lack of side walks is a serious issue, as is lack of enough shoulder to walk on. And things tend to be spread out. Most folks find it incomprehensible that I live without a car. (And I mostly walk. The public transit system is a case of "You can't get there from here.")

As for "hot": I rarely have to walk the entire way to or from work. Offers of rides have picked up with the summer heat. I am routinely offered a ride with a comment about how it's just too hot out here for someone to walk. So I think a lot of folks do find the heat discourages physical activity (unless it revolves around a swimming pool).

The heat isn't usually a problem for me but sometimes the oppressive humidity is. But, then, I used to walk for exercise in The Mojave Desert -- and had to wait until after dark for it to drop down to 99F in the summer.

</comment><comment><USER16> I live in Mississippi, and every time I leave the South I see a very noticeable difference in how people look. It has gotten much worse in the past 10 years. I recall growing up and going to the store, the electric carts were always parked in the front of the store. Now they are always in use by someone too large to walk. It's very sad.

And I believe this article confirms my mental state, I do go running when its 100 degrees outside.

<comment><USER3> OT, but are you near the Gulf Coast? I'm in Ocean Springs. I've been looking for hacker meetups, but outside of the local LUG, there's not a lot.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Three words..."deep fried Twinkies!"

I'm sure sweet tea doesn't help either.

</comment><comment><USER18> Fried Krispy Kreme cheeseburgers with bacon?

</comment><comment><USER19> Cornbread.

</comment><comment><USER20> Here's a 10x better question: Why did Southerners get so much fatter since 1970?

This is new. And there are lots of reasons to think it's not an epidemic of pleny: [http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=2121...](http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=21216)

<comment><USER13> Here's a written article by the same person: <http://www.nasw.org/awards/2001/01Taubesarticle1.htm>

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I saw food inc. the other day. one interesting point made in the documentary was that income levels effect obesity. people with less income are not able to by the most nutritious food and settle for foods "rich" in hydrogenated corn syrup. foods made with hydrogenated corn syrup are often less expensive because corn has been subsidized, is cheap, and can be stored for a verrrry long time.

<comment><USER22> Aren't the cheapest foods the simplest, least processed: produce, grains, etc.? No-high-fructose-corn-sweetener-water is cheaper than Coke. Two apples and a banana are cheaper than a bag of Doritos.

<comment><USER13> Yup. You can eat cheap as dirt if you cook your own Indian food. Rice, dried beans, vegetables, and spices--all are available in almost any grocery store for lower prices than anything else. It's really easy, too, and tastes way better than, hmm, just about anything.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Sourced Claim – only news that's proven with a primary source - <AUTHOR> http://sourcedclaim.com <comment><USER2> The only problem with a site like this is that the fake news spreaders are predominantly the people who believe that sources are a liberal conspiracy. So the fake news share-ers will not care if there is no primary source, just like they don't care if there is a snopes article about it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Figured I'd make something for people (like myself) that want more sourced information, but are frustrated with the signal to noise ratio these days. Would be surprised if it reached people who regularly fall for fake news (at least at first).

<comment><USER2> If you could find a way though, the world would owe you a great debt of gratitude!</comment></comment></comment>


KVM on Illumos (OpenSolaris fork) - <AUTHOR> http://dtrace.org/blogs/bmc/2011/08/15/kvm-on-illumos/

<comment><USER2> Illumos. I'm still very excited about this project. Let's not forget how powerful OpenSolaris still is.

<comment><USER3> You should be! As far as I can tell, Illumos is the only kernel project out there that is solving exciting new problems, instead of reimplementing solutions to old ones.

<comment><USER4> Taking code from the Linux kernel and porting it to Solaris is solving exciting new problems and not re-implementing solutions?

<comment><USER3> They didn't re-implement KVM. They ported it (to the greatest extent possible), because it was already a suitable solution.

I wasn't referring to the KVM port as a solution to an exciting new problem (it was, but a while ago, thus making the problem stale). But it was a much needed solution. I was referring to innovations that originated in the Illumos code base such as ZFS, DTrace, zones, doors, crossbow, ctf, least-privilege, etc. All of these are either unavailable on most systems, have inferior clones (i.e. systemtap, btrfs), or are partially available (the Mac DTrace port doesn't have a complete, systemic scope, due to Apple's classist tendencies, and most of the kernel providers like fsinfo are missing, for example).

Either way, I still maintain that Illumos is a nexus of systems innovation compared to other kernels, based on how much innovative technology originated in the Illumos kernel, before being ported to or reimplemented on other kernels (the Slab Allocator is an example of a technology that originated in this code-base and has been reimplemented on almost all other kernels; ZFS and DTrace are examples of technologies that have been ported over to some other kernels, albeit with less functionality/stability).

Also, the release of Illumos-KVM (among other improvements in the last year) only goes to show that Illumos is still innovating in various ways, while other kernels are either still catching up (I believe that FreeBSD didn't support DTrace'ing userland apps until their 2009 release) or losing differentiators (linux just lost KVM). Seeing as how the Illumos project has quite a bit of engineering talent and corporate investment behind it, I doubt that the rate of innovation will drop below that of other kernels... in fact it might just increase, now that potential contributors know that Oracle/Sun doesn't have a monopoly

<comment><USER3> The last sentence was cut off:

"... a monopoly on the engineering talent."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This announcement is part of their SmartOS release: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2887170></comment>


No Longer in Shadows, Pentagon's UFO Unit Will Make Some Findings Public - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/23/us/politics/pentagon-ufo-harry-reid-navy.html <comment><USER2> > Mr. Davis, who now works for Aerospace Corporation, a defense contractor, > said he gave a classified briefing to a Defense Department agency as > recently as March about retrievals from "off-world vehicles not made on this > earth."

> Mr. Davis said he also gave classified briefings on retrievals of > unexplained objects to staff members of the Senate Armed Services Committee > on Oct. 21, 2019, and to members of the Senate Intelligence Committee two > days later.

I'm not well rehearsed on the recent history of the subject but this sounds like confirmation of crashed extra-terrestrial vehicles from a reliable/not crazy source quoted by the New York Times? I'm surprised that this isn't bigger news...

<comment><USER3> I'm skeptical but open to the possibility as improbable as it is. My inclination is someone trying to make a buck.

<comment><USER2> My initial assumption was the same, especially with the type of claims this topic has elicited in the past. That being said, the individual making the claim (Eric Davis) seems reputable[0] enough to not risk his career/stature for a buck. He has a PhD in astrophysics and more than a handful of publications and citations in the field. Given the magnitude of the claim, I'd say skepticism is still warranted though.

[0] [https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Eric_Davis6](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Eric_Davis6)

<comment><USER4> Certainly releases interesting papers ha wormholes and vacuum energy

nice username

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Non-paywalled link [https://web.archive.org/web/20200724025436/https://www.nytim...](https://web.archive.org/web/20200724025436/https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/23/us/politics/pentagon- ufo-harry-reid-navy.html)

</comment><comment><USER6> Doesn't this render the "SETI v. METI" debate moot? The argument against first contact signalling was presupposed on a security via obscurity argument. We terrans are such an insignificant, technologically primitive speck in the cosmos. That the slightest ping would surely result in our colonization. But now the atomic fact: visitors from distant worlds have arrived. Isn't it time at least in theory to develop inter-species communication protocols? Or do we just assume they can read our hearts and minds?

Reworking the SETI Paradox: METI's Place on the Continuum of Astrobiological Signaling

[https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.01167](https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.01167)</comment>


What questions should I ask Pandora founder Tim Westergrin? - <AUTHOR>

In two hours I get to sit down and talk with Pandora founder Tim Westergrin, along with a few other students. What would you guys ask if you had the chance to talk to him? <comment><USER2> I'd want to hear about the intricacies of their new audio advertising program.

What have they learned about listener preferences through tweaking the length, frequency, and targeting of audio ads? Are they making demographic inferences based off of music genre?

I'm also really curious about the creative on those audio ads. Do ad buyers know alongside which genres their ads will be broadcast? Do they adjust creative appropriately, i.e. hip-hop audio ad creative on a station of hip-hop music? I realize that each "station" is really an instance of user preferences, but still...

I could go on and on... I wonder if there is a cool side-business opportunity for supplying their ad buyers with creative (via a network involving independent commercial musicians/producers). This could help their ads become more effective and turn into something interesting itself.

<comment><USER3> On that note, it's interesting that pandora.com, the website, serves ads but the Windows Sidebar gadget does not. Does the iPhone app serve ads? Those might be an interesting place to wander into...

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Maybe you could ask him about their back end infrastructure? It is always fascinating to learn how they manage to handle streaming music seamlessly to their many users.</comment>


An Astronaut Who Might Get Us to Mars - <AUTHOR> https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/the-astronaut-who-might-actually-get-us-to-mars/ <comment><USER3> Article doesnt use correct words. Author isnt a space geek. Vasimir engines can indeed "escape earth orbit" ... they cannot get TO orbit, ie escape gravity. Lots of other odd phrases and mistakes (galactic rays?). I stopped after skimming a few paragraphs.

</comment><comment><USER4> I'd love VASIMR to work, but the dev process has been horrifically long and I am not optimistic. Someday, someone will figure it out.

<comment><USER5> I may be throwing a pie in the sky here, but is there any reasonable hope that AI will be able to design rocket engines, including ones based on advanced concepts like VASIMR, in the coming decades?

<comment><USER6> To me it seems AI will be good at optimizing things but probably not good at coming up with breakthrough technology.

<comment> crooked-v Viewed from far enough away, all of rocketry is an optimization problem.

<comment><USER6> Very true at this time. Progress is very incremental until someone comes up with a fundamentally new method.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The company has a lot of work and testing to do to get VASIMR to a point where it has better efficiency than existing operational electric thrusters. Also, even Ad Astra admits that solar electric power will never generate the thrust needed for some of their pie-in-the-sky goals, and that nuclear reactor technology that doesn't exist yet would be needed.

<comment><USER8> There was a project in parallel with nautilus to build a nuclear airplane. It can be done.

<comment><USER7> Oh yes, I've seen the nuclear reactors that were built to power aircraft, they are on display at the site of Experimental Breeder Reactor No. 1* in Idaho.

*[http://www4vip.inl.gov/ebr/](http://www4vip.inl.gov/ebr/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> get _Us_ to mars, or that astronaut? well, i'll stay at home and clean up the dust :)

<comment><USER10> He's 67 years old, so I doubt he'd be making the trip himself. Nor would you or I, of course. Other astronauts would, presumably.

<comment><USER9> you'd probably be correct :)

while i am hugely interested in space exploration and such, i find it a folly that we spend so much attention to going to Mars.. and going to spend billions (in the long term maybe even trillions) of dollars on it while our planet - <USER2> perfectly habitable home still - withers away by our doing.

imho we should get our priorities straight.. listening mr. Musk?

<comment> happy-go-lucky I never understand why some people are so gung ho about colonizing Mars while ours is still the most hospitable planet in the observable universe. It may be that their thoughts are driven by a survivalist instinct and they are using Mars as a crutch.

<comment><USER11> The drive for novelty and exploration is deeply rooted in the human psyche. So it really isn't that surprising at all.

As a plus, tons of beneficial technology and research directly resulted from previous efforts in space. It seems highly likely this would also be the case for efforts to get to Mars or any other space exploration programs.

I think the strongest case against Mars is simply that we should do it, but not now, and instead in several decades. However, my guess is that we have capability to do it now, in an effective manner and for a reasonable cost.

Someone has to pave the way for humanity to spread out into solar system. It will certainly happen in the coming centuries, one way or another. The incredibly rich energy sources available are by themselves such a compelling reason that I think it is inevitable.

Of course, assuming some sort of terrible catastrophe of our own making doesn't set us back a few thousand years...

<comment><USER9> > I think the strongest case against Mars is simply that we should do it, but > not now, and instead in several decades.

yes, this is my feeling on this as well</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


James Damore is (almost certainly) not a victim of a free-speech violation - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/james-damore-google-anti-diversity-manifesto-free-speech-2017-8 <comment><USER2> There's something grotesque about the Left suddenly embracing at-will employment as the best thing in the world that's key to a just society.

The First Amendment clearly doesn't protect Damore. But there's more to free speech than the First Amendment. If employees try to start a union but the employer fires without consequence everyone who talks about it or likes it on Facebook, is that a society where free speech is valued?

<comment><USER3> The right to unionize is not part of free speech. The actions you mentioned are not protected under the First Amendment. Instead, they are protected by sections 6 and 7 of the National Labor Relations Act.

Similarly, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and followup legislation grant additional protections to employees for matters regarding discrimination against a protected class of people, including speech rights which are not otherwise protected in the workplace by the First Amendment.

There is more to the First Amendment than free speech. It also includes the freedom to assemble, which is closely or even interchangeable with the freedom of association. This is what allows a group to expel someone from the group as a consequence of speaking in a way which the group disagrees with.

<comment><USER2> > The right to unionize is not part of free speech. The actions you mentioned > are not protected under the First Amendment. Instead, they are protected by > sections 6 and 7 of the National Labor Relations Act.

Yes, which is exactly the point. Lazy justifications of any non-governmental punishment of speech with "well the First Amendment doesn't protect against it, so it's fine!" is just that: lazy.

> There is more to the First Amendment than free speech.

Yes. And there is more to free speech than the First Amendment.

<comment><USER3> Which is why "the Left" didn't make that lazy argument. They added laws which protected that sort of speech, which took years of political effort.

The Left's arguments were also much more concrete than an appeal to "free speech". Suppress the right to unionize and there will be wildcat strikes and a return to the violent actions of the 1800s. Allow workplace discrimination on the basis of skin color and there will be a return to the horrors of the Jim Crow era. Don't discriminate against women in the workplace because the experience of WWII shows that women are much more capable than was previously thought. [0]

You'll also notice that "the Left" deliberately made it harder for people to make some sorts of speech at work, if it results in a hostile workplace. Why, it's almost as if they consistently believe that "free speech" at the workplace has a lesser standing than free speech in a public arena.

Sure, there's more to free speech than the First Amendment. There's also more to freedom of assembly than the First Amendment. There is a necessary tension between the two no matter how it is embodied. If freedom of speech trumps the freedom of assembly then there is no liberty.

[0] Also, don't discriminated against men, eg, "men aren't allowed to be nurses." Really the argument is that there are very few jobs with a bona fide reason for discrimination on the basis of gender.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This article repeats "The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo", namely calling it "anti-diversity manifesto". The issue was discussed here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14959601](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14959601)

<comment><USER5> How to spin news for power and profit 101. Control the wording and you bias the people.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Nobody is arguing that he is a victim of his "free speech rights" being violated.

People _are_ arguing that Google is acting like a thug.

<comment><USER7> If he had only posted it anonymously he wouldn't have put Google in such an awkward position. What do you do with someone that many will not want to work with?

<comment><USER2> Should Hobby Lobby be able to fire a transman employee who publicly transitions, just because many of his coworkers would not want to work with him?

<comment><USER8> You're comparing simply being to publicly soapboxing. That's an absurd comparison.

A more apt comparison is if that trans person disseminated a controversial manifesto about gender theory on company time with company services.

<comment><USER2> The person I was responding to stated that a company should fire an employee if other employees don't want to work with him. If we accept offense as the metric by which we decide whether someone should be fired or not, then you bite the bullet and accept the consequences of applying that principle uniformly.

You seem to be taking the perspective that evil people must be fired, and other people shouldn't. Which may be defensible, but off-topic to this particular thread.

<comment><USER8> > You seem to be taking the perspective that evil people must be fired

Spare me the extrapolation. My position is clear: Stupid people should be fired.

<comment><USER9> I'm pretty sure that was the position of the "manifesto" as well.

<comment><USER8> Only one person involved showed demonstrable stupidity, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The last two paragraphs are quite telling:

> In sum, Damore may have enough of a complaint to file a case, but that case > — ultimately — won't get very far unless the US Supreme Court is willing to > adopt California law, widen it, and give all Americans a new right to use > their bosses' computers for political activity. That, given the court's 5-4 > conservative majority, seems unlikely.

On the other hand, the conservative judges might sympathize with Damore, but...

> It is rare that conservatives argue for the rights of employers to be > restricted when it comes to firing workers. They ought to tread very > carefully with that insistence. Such a right could give every communist, > every member of the KKK, and every Hillary Clinton voter an equal right to > fill up their internal workplace bulletin boards with propaganda of their > pleasing.

...but Business Insider warns the judges that if they choose to back up Damore, workplaces might become filled with communist propaganda.

</comment><comment><USER11> Ironically Google appear to want to create a yes men/women culture. Anybody with a descenting view knows they have to tow the company line to keep their job.

Those trying to make the workplace more equal are going to find it harder to meet the people they need to reach. Education would have been a better choice.

</comment><comment><USER12> The ol' freedom of speech but not freedom from consequences bit

<comment><USER13> "Sure, you are free to say what you want, but you won't be free from the consequence of getting shot" \--A certain Joseph Stalin.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's an open and shut situation: He used company time and company services to disseminate a controversial position to a captive audience of coworkers. Had he posted this on his personal blog in off hours, he would have a case, and most likely, still have a job.

It showed terrible judgement on his part, and that's not even getting into the content of the manifesto.

<comment><USER14> >Had he posted this on his personal blog in off hours, he would have a case, and most likely, still have a job.

Doubtful. Brendan Eich was ousted for "controversial politics" on his own time. In the current climate, there'd still be the same outrage ("Googler has evil thoughts, why isn't Google firing him?!"). If anything, he'd have even less of a case in the court of public sympathy, as the entire point of this guy's post was not just diversity issues in general but how they applied to Google's internal operations. Taking the initiative to air that publicly would have been an intentional hit against Google PR. In this case, though, the author of this memo had posted it to internal Google groups, and then presumably an ideological opponent leaked it to the public for the purposes of stirring public opinion against the author.

<comment><USER8> > Brendan Eich was ousted for "controversial politics" on his own time.

That's a completely different situation, and can't really be compared. A CEO position for a non-profit and Sr. Engineer at Google are not comparable.

A CEO position is the public face of a company. There is so much more that goes into it on multiple levels than being an engineer with only 4 years under their belt who nobody has ever heard of.

Had he posted this to a personal blog, it would have barely been a footnote. And more importantly, California law would have protected him.

<comment><USER15> Not in this day and age. One of my high school teachers posted political commentary to his Facebook profile that was controversial to some. It went viral and he got fired...effectively for his religious beliefs. We live in a day and age of viral outrage. So some might say he's a teacher and therefore he can't make his students uncomfortable. So his free speech is effectively cut off. Meanwhile as a student in college I'm forced to suffer through the opinions of heavily biased professors who literally assign term papers which only act as exercises in progressive liberal confirmation bias.

<comment><USER8> K-12 teachers have always had an ethical behavior imperative outside of school, by virtue of their position. That's nothing new. The difference now is that so much of what we do is found so easily.

I can't really evaluate anything else you've said without examples of that person's "religious beliefs" or your professors "heavily biased progressive liberal confirmation bias".

<comment><USER15> There's nothing unethical about posting an opinion on Facebook. I was literally unfriended by a progressive classmate of mine because I ate Chik- Fil-A nuggets in the wake of that company's CEO's stance on gay marriage. I support gay marriage...but I just wanted some sweet tea and fried chicken. I suppose I was not sufficiently outraged for this progressive. That's how bad some people have gotten.

<comment><USER8> I don't understand. Are you a K-12 teacher? Ethical behavior imperatives apply to K-12 teachers.

I'm sorry you got unfriended though. I hope you're doing ok.

<comment><USER15> I'm just indicating how strongly people feel about their views these days. I wouldn't even unfriend someone for saying offensive things about conservatives, even though my whole family is that. People have gotten very tribal and very righteous about very trivial things (like chicken nuggets).

K-12 teachers still deserve first amendment rights. They have a right to say controversial things (outside of work hours)...that's precisely what the Constitution protects. This isn't ethics...this is speech. If folks haven't learned to accept that some people will sometimes offend you with their opinions and that it's okay...then I question their ability to function as adults. The teacher did end up getting reinstated but not before some lengthy dragged out debacle.

We can't say the first amendment applies to everyone except teachers or CEOs or (insert arbitrary profession here). We can't say progressive views are inherently less offensive than conservative views and proceed to shut down conservative speech through intimidation or termination. That's ridiculous. It doesn't matter which class of people were offended.

If all that matters is who is offended the strongest, then all you're doing is setting up an arms race for which side can get the most riled up. You're not encouraging constructive dialog and nobody is growing. Offensive speech happens.

<comment><USER3> "These days"? This is nothing new. People did the same with Coors back in the 1960s and 1970s. Quoting from [http://www.cpr.org/news/story/coors-boycott- when-beer-can-si...](http://www.cpr.org/news/story/coors-boycott-when-beer- can-signaled-your-politics)

"For some Americans in the 1960s and 1970s, Coors—the iconic Rocky Mountain brew—signified views about labor, race, and gender equality. The Coors boycotts, beginning in 1966 and lasting, for some people, right up to the present, connected a wide spectrum of activists and organizations, much like the successful grape boycott organized by Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers in the 1960s. ... In 1969, 43 Chicano students at Southern Colorado State College (SCSC) - now Colorado State University-Pueblo- joined hands around the campus pub to keep people from ordering any Coors beer. ... The boycotts had a clear financial impact. In California, where anti-Coors sentiment was high, the company's share of the state beer market slid from 40 percent in 1977 to 14 percent in 1984."

Here's a quote from "The Milagro Beanfield War", written in 1974.: "Okay, gimme a pack of Camels and a Coors tallboy. No, wait a sec, make that a Hamms, there's a boycott on Coors."

Here's an article from the Lakeland Ledger Dec 28, 1975, [https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1346&dat=19751228&id=...](https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1346&dat=19751228&id=qEdNAAAAIBAJ&sjid=4foDAAAAIBAJ&pg=4777,7408732) . Among other things, numerous gay bars in SF stopped serving Coors already by that time.

Regarding K-12 teachers, see [https://www.aclu-wa.org/docs/free-speech-rights- public-schoo...](https://www.aclu-wa.org/docs/free-speech-rights-public- school-teachers-washington-state) . They have First Amendment rights. "However, if you use social media to comment about students, school or other work-related matters, or you use it to engage in what might be considered conduct impairing your functioning as a teacher, the First Amendment may not protect you."

It then lists some examples:

• a court upheld a demotion of a teacher who posted derogatory comments about a school administrator on her blog.

• a court upheld the firing of a teacher who communicated with students through MySpace inappropriately, "as if he were their peer."

• A court upheld the firing of a teacher who posted sexually explicit Craigslist ads ("immoral conduct" made him unfit to teach).

The relevant Supreme Court case is Garcetti v. Ceballos, which applies to all public employees.

As the last point shows, K-12 teachers are often subject to morality clauses, with a gray area in what that means. Olivia Sprauer in FL was fired for working in off-hours as a glamour model, wearing bikinis.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


How to Run a Bord Meeting: The Slide Deck - <AUTHOR> http://jrodthoughts.com/2014/03/20/how-to-run-a-bord-meeting-the-slide-deck/

<comment><USER2> How to run a Board Meeting: Use [http://boardeffect.com](http://boardeffect.com)</comment>


The nearly 5M US Census Blocks with zero population (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://tumblr.mapsbynik.com/post/82791188950/nobody-lives-here-the-nearly-5-million-census <comment><USER2> If you can, take a ride on a smaller aircraft over California. The first thing I noticed was almost everything is uninhabited. US Forest Service manages 20 million acres of National Forest land in California. _Another_ large portion is state park systems. California State Parks began the 1990s with over 260 park units, 280 miles of coastline, 625 miles of lake and river frontage, nearly 18,000 campsites, 3,000 miles of hiking, biking and equestrian trails, and 450 miles of off-highway vehicle trails on nearly 1.3 million acres. [ii]

[https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=940](https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=940)

<comment><USER3> Let's hope it stays this way.

<comment><USER4> Why wouldn't it? Humans prefer living next to each other, creating dense clusters.

<comment><USER3> Well, for example: [https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health- science/trump...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health- science/trump-signs-order-at-the-epa-to-dismantle-environmental- protections/2017/03/28/3ec30240-13e2-11e7-ada0-1489b735b3a3_story.html)

<comment><USER5> The Trump EPA is going to force people to live in the badlands?

<comment><USER6> The worry is that the land will transition from public recreation to business resource extraction uses.

<comment><USER7> Is the worry substantiated by anything in Trump's order?

<comment><USER6> >"Accordingly, it is the policy of the United States that executive departments and agencies (agencies) immediately review existing regulations that potentially burden the development or use of domestically produced energy resources and appropriately suspend, revise, or rescind those that unduly burden the development of domestic energy resources beyond the degree necessary to protect the public interest or otherwise comply with the law."

Who knows to what degree these lands are considered "the public interest" vs. "undue burden" in the Secretary of the Interior's mind. But the rules regarding drilling on public land are specifically called out for review, indicating that the White House believes they are currently too strict.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> _Despite having a population of more than 310 million people, no one calls 47 percent of the USA "home"._

Wow wouldn't have guessed it was that high. I'd like to see the same map but excluding national parks/public spaces.

<comment><USER9> This reminds me how SF writers were expecting that people will colonize other planets, 50 years ago.

We'll somehow go all the way over there and find a way to live in those hostile conditions.

Guess what, fast forward, people don't _just_ want to stay on Earth, but will also prefer SF proper, Manhattan and/or Paris within 20 arrondissements.

Even smaller cities are losing population. I guess that Spengler's narrative lives on.

<comment><USER10> Took me a second to figure out your first use of "SF" was "science fiction" and the second was "San Francisco"

<comment><USER11> I'm glad I wasn't the only one. I was very confused for a moment after reading that comment. Never seen the acronym "SF" used for science fiction before.

<comment><USER12> [https://google.com/search?q=SF+writer](https://google.com/search?q=SF+writer) doesn't list writers from San Francico

SF straight in the title of [https://www.amazon.com/Other-Worlds-SF-Human- Imagination/dp/...](https://www.amazon.com/Other-Worlds-SF-Human- Imagination/dp/0307741761)

SF also serves to include both 'science fiction' and 'speculative fiction' but that's a whole other debate

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> If you go to a random spot anywhere in the world, there's a good chance there's not a lot of people there.

The site [http://confluence.org/](http://confluence.org/) catalogs visits to intersections of latitude and longitude. Drill down into one of the maps and you'll probably find mostly empty spaces.

Map of USA: [http://confluence.org/country.php?id=1&showmap=true](http://confluence.org/country.php?id=1&showmap=true)

</comment><comment><USER14> It'd be interesting to see an overlay of areas that are inhospitable to wild animals, perhaps excluding birds. Mostly because that would be a useful indication of how much inhabitable land is monopolized by humans.

<comment><USER15> Exactly what wild animals would we be considering? Pigeons live in the wild in virtually every temperate city on earth. I think there are coyotes in New York's Central Park.

<comment><USER16> Mammals that are at least as big as humans perhaps.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> So census blocks include federally owned land? That would account for the emptiness, as most of the west is government owned and not open to settlement

</comment><comment><USER18> Maybe its just my phone buy i couldnt read the article. The end of every line was chopped off, and it wouldnt let me scroll to see more...

</comment><comment><USER19> I know where I'm moving

<comment><USER20> You probably can't or don't want to move to most of these places (parks, lakes, deserts, etc...)

<comment><USER21> I'd guess "about half." The rest might be uninhabited and open to settlement (e.g. North Dakota)...but the commute might be sort of long ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Somewhat related, a reminder that the US Census for 2020 is in a state of hiatus - the US Census director resigned 20 days ago - [https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/us- census...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/us-census- director-resigns-amid-turmoil-over-funding- of-2020-count/2017/05/09/8f8657c6-34ea-11e7-b412-62beef8121f7_story.html)

</comment><comment> mike-cardwell The USA is about 40 times larger than the UK in land mass, but only has a population 5 times larger.

You would need to increase your population from 320 million to 2.6 billion to have the same population density as us.

You have so much free space you could absorb the entire population of Europe. Logistics aside. Which makes some US citizens fear of immigration even more laughable.

<comment><USER9> But come to think of that, immigration doesn't target flyover areas - not so many immigrants come to middle of nowhere places. Instead the (desirable) coast areas get packed.

Maybe the fears of immigration are laughable, maybe not, but your argument doesn't hold water.

<comment><USER23> That's false. There are lots of immigrants to Minnesota, from places like Laos, Mexico, Ethiopia, and Somalia. Heck, Minneapolis/St.Paul is one of the largest groupings of the Somali diaspora. Immigrants don't just live in the cities but also small towns.

But anyway, who makes the mort stink about immigrants? The exact place you say immigrants aren't coming: flyover country.

<comment><USER24> Texas also has both a huge amount of land, and a large number of immigrants (around 15-20% of the state's population is foreign-born).

<comment><USER25> Do you have any insight for someone that knows very little about american geography as to why this is?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> The fear is due to racism, scapegoating, and a general inability to cope with a changing population...

[https://thinkprogress.org/poll-americans-anti-immigrant- atti...](https://thinkprogress.org/poll-americans-anti-immigrant-attitudes- are-fueled-by-racism-30968b83a908)

[http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/136843021667730...](http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1368430216677304)

[http://groups.psych.northwestern.edu/spcl/documents/Craig_Ri...](http://groups.psych.northwestern.edu/spcl/documents/Craig_RichesonPS_updatedversion.pdf)

[http://press.princeton.edu/titles/10516.html](http://press.princeton.edu/titles/10516.html)

<comment><USER27> _cope with a changing population_

Why is it just westerners/whites who are expected to cope with a changing population?

Can you imagine a scenario in which say Beijing, or Tokyo, or Jakarta, or Riyadh, or Nairobi, or Lagos, or Mumbai were filled with a foreign population that was greater than 50% of the total population for the city?

Can you imagine a scenario where any country outside the western world had demographic numbers showing that foreigners outnumbering the founding population group of the country in the sub 25 age group?

These scenarios are unimaginable and quite absurd even to ponder for anywhere outside of white countries. And yet, have you been to London? Have you looked at demographic charts?

People can raise objections to the population displacement you seem to favor without it having anything to do with "racism, scapegoating, and a general inability to cope," or "muh jerbs."

There are plenty of westerners who think, "We've got a pretty good thing going here, we've brought a lot of good to ourselves and the world as a whole. And we'd rather not see our civilization drastically altered, because a drastic altering of our civilization will impede our efforts and abilities to go on doing good for ourselves and the world."

<comment> crooked-v > that was greater than 50% of the total population for the city?

So... where, exactly, is this supposed to be analogous to?

<comment><USER28> San Diego was over 90% non-Hispanic whites up until the 50's, now they represent roughly 45% of the population -- and that's excluding many of the major Hispanic enclaves south of the city proper.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


HTML5 Canvas - The Future of Graphics on the Web - <AUTHOR> http://www.slideshare.net/robhawkes/html5-canvas-the-future-of-graphics-on-the-web <comment><USER2> Canvas seems like a really cool way to interact with raster graphics. But more and more it is also being used for animating vector graphics, you know, collections of lines, curves and gradients. Isn't SVG better suited for this?

Slides 33-35 talk about animating things in the Canvas. Clearing the frame and imperatively re-adding each element at each step seems awfully inefficient. The underlying rendering engine could optimize things much better if it was given more abstract information about the shapes and transformations involved, a la SVG.

Is there something I'm missing? Why isn't more done with SVG?

<comment><USER3> Well, this is truly scary as I'm developing a bunch of physics animations using svg. I hope they don't do away with it.

<comment><USER4> There are already some (imperfect) tools for rendering svg with javascript/canvas. If SVG ever went away as a standalone things it would be at a time where usable fallbacks ara available.

That said, Canvas doesn't yet support all the same fill modes as svg. I got caught by the lack of even-odd once.

<comment><USER3> _If SVG ever went away as a standalone things it would be at a time where usable fallbacks ara available_

Thanks. I'll keep it simple then.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> note: Flash required to view this

<comment><USER6> This is what I get on my iPad (which is how I had already happened to view it before coming here to look at the comments): <http://dl.dropbox.com/u/360937/Slideshare-iPad.jpg>

Works pretty well.

<comment><USER7> I'm guessing you didn't flip beyond the title page.

<comment><USER6> I did. There were a couple missing slide images, but I don't think that was Flash-related. Here's a slide near the end, for example:

[http://dl.dropbox.com/u/360937/Mobile%20Photo%20Jun%207%2C%2...](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/360937/Mobile%20Photo%20Jun%207%2C%202010%201%2015%2014%20AM.jpg)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Spreadsheet of 1,847 stolen online courses and how to fix it - <AUTHOR> https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/12oxBlJ1xlVDCVhpI0VLrzZs7uFu_-uYHnoD-gGDF0Ew/edit?usp=sharing <comment><USER2> Sorry chief but I don't believe in imaginary property

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> hi everyone, i was stolen from last weekend by a scammer who bought my course, listed it for sale on his "group buying" site, then filed a chargeback.

i put everything i know in this spreadsheet; tldr you can email the website admins and they'll remove your course.

[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/12oxBlJ1xlVDCVhpI0VLr...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/12oxBlJ1xlVDCVhpI0VLrzZs7uFu_- uYHnoD-gGDF0Ew/edit?usp=sharing)</comment>